Note: This short article includes spoilers for numerous Succession episodes, especially season 4, episode 4, “Honeymoon States.”
In “Honeymoon States,” the 4th episode of Succession’s last season, everybody’s weaponizing Logan’s memory to fit their own ends.
While he lived, Logan kept a firmly held picture of shrewdness and undisputable power, however even he can’t manage how he’ll be kept in mind. Early in the episode, the Roy kids rifle through their dad’s numerous paper obituaries; “The evaluations remain in,” Roman quips. They have plenty of euphemisms that the kids have a good time equating. According to one, Logan was a “complex guy,” which Kendall takes to indicate “tossed phones at personnel”; another calls him a “organization genius,” which is plainly a generous method to explain somebody who never ever paid taxes.
The core drama of this episode, nevertheless, focuses on another paper: a file that Waystar vice chairman Frank Vernon (Peter Friedman) finds in Logan’s personal safe. It ends up that at one point, Logan (Brian Cox) had actually called Kendall (Jeremy Strong) as his follower. Kendall is rocked by what appear like concrete verification that Logan picked him, however is likewise pestered by the frustrating uncertainty of the paper. It’s filled with pencil doodles, consisting of a mark near Kendall’s name. Was Logan highlighting it or, as Shiv (Sarah Snook) catches as a possibility, was he attempting to cross Ken’s name out? (” It sure as fucking shit does not state ‘Shiv,'” Kendall bites back.)
Later on, he asks Frank if it’s genuine, barely able to think his own eyes. It seems like not just evidence of Logan’s esteem, however even whatever love and love he had for his 2nd boy. It’s likewise vicious in essential Logan style– an uncertain little chicken scratch from beyond the tomb for Kendall to consume over. “He made me dislike him, and after that he passed away,” Kendall states ruefully. Frank assures him. “He was an old bastard– and he liked you,” he states.
Kendall and his brother or sisters most likely will not ever understand for sure what their dad truly believed or planned, however that will not stop them from translating Logan’s puzzling last message through the lens of their desires and insecurities. Being called Logan’s favored follower is lawfully useless– the CEO is chosen by a board vote, not by Logan’s will. The other Waystar officers, and Kendall’s brother or sisters, fast to mention that the file is undated, which nobody was notified of its presence. However for Kendall, it has all the significance worldwide: He now has a narrative about what his powerful dad desired, and he’s keeping up it.
Musical chairs of power
The totality of “Honeymoon States” happens in Logan’s house, where a circus of politicians and titans of market have actually collected to grieve the just recently deceased household patriarch. Even Marcia (Hiam Abbass) has actually returned from her shopping journey in Milan, staking her claim over her castle (and likewise promptly offering it to Connor when he reveals interest in it). The centerpiece, nevertheless, is a board conference where a brand-new interim Waystar CEO will be selected. The household table is now inhabited totally by Waystar fits, and rather of Logan, primary monetary officer Karl Muller (David Rasche) is sitting at the head. Roman (Kieran Culkin), as he takes a look at the tableau, mentions that Logan had actually been intending on shooting half of them.
However Logan isn’t around any longer, and the Waystar officers whisper avariciously about which possible CEO to rally behind. The Roy kids, unsurprisingly, are no place on their list; Karl recommends informing the board that Logan’s generate aren’t “constitutionally fully equipped at this moment to handle the function”– or, as Tom puts it, they’re “errors and dipshits.” The masks have actually come off. Everybody is rushing to toss their names into the hat, and they rapidly get snide with one another. Karl describes Gerri Kellman’s (J. Smith-Cameron) quick period as interim CEO as her “tilt at the windmill,” while Gerri suggests that it’s long previous time for Karl to retire.
It’s a truth of life that everybody orbiting Waystar and the Roy household attempts to utilize their distance to power to their benefit, however this episode is a suggestion that whatever power they handle to get, they permanently stay standing on quicksand. We see both Tom (Matthew Macfadyen) and Greg (Nicholas Braun) attempting to get in anybody’s excellent enhances, like a set of barnacles searching for a whale to connect themselves to. Kerry (Zoe Winters), Logan’s assistant-turned-lover, has actually likewise dropped in the power rankings. She makes an inexpedient look at the house, babbling nearly incoherently about going upstairs to gather her things. However Marcia coldly informs her that her things are currently in a bag. Kerry blathers something about Logan making plans to wed her, however it’s clear that has to do with as helpful as fairy dust now. Kerry is secured the back door; Roman demonstrations that this is all a little extreme, however Marcia, in an extremely calm voice, informs him that a taxi will transfer Kerry at the train station so she can go back to her “little house.”
Kendall is back on a damaging course
Throughout this season, Kendall has actually maintained a caring, collective relationship with his more youthful brother or sisters. They’re still intending on purchasing and revamping Pierce Global Media as quickly as Waystar is offered to streaming business GoJo– which may not take place after all. (GoJo creator Lukas Matsson (( Alexander SkarsgÃ¥rd)) is being cagey, and now desires the Roy kids to visit him in Sweden.) Kendall even extols how treatment has actually been assisting him with his sorrow; regardless of Logan’s death, he’s psychologically most likely in the very best location we have actually ever seen him.
However Kendall is permanently an addict, many of all an addict to the concept of being a guy his dad would take pride in. He can’t stop consuming over the concept that Logan had actually documented which of his offspring was most deserving of using up his mantle. This is something concrete. It has much more weight than whatever brief little flattery Logan tossed at his kids when it was beneficial to do so.
Kendall believes he must be interim CEO, and confides in Frank– who, regardless of outlining to wrest power from the kids minutes earlier, is regularly Kendall’s confidant in his most susceptible minutes. “You truly desire back in?” Frank asks, understanding that attempting to be Logan 2.0 has actually sent out Ken to the verge of death prior to. Perhaps Frank’s simply angling to get rid of a few of the competitors, however you likewise notice that he truly does stress over Kendall returning into the ring simply when he appeared to be doing much better.
Shiv is pregnant and alone
Kendall gets to deal with rallying soldiers behind him: He gets Waystar board members Sandi Furness and Stewy Hosseini on his side, and after that nervously approaches his brother or sisters. Roman’s and Shiv’s hackles are up as quickly as Kendall attempts to justify why he must be CEO. To soothe them down, he ensures them he’ll simply be the token for what’s truly a three-way reign. Shiv and Roman do not like that their egalitarian collaboration is being liquified, therefore Kendall magnanimously accepts share the leading function with Roman.
Shiv bristles at this exemption. If both of them are going to be CEO, why not simply make it 3? Kendall informs her she has no experience, and Roman backs him up. “3 is a bit wonky,” Roman states. Her siblings make whisperings about Shiv still being on the within whatever, that they would just be CEO up until the GoJo offer goes through. We have actually heard this one prior to; the previous 3 seasons have actually demonstrated how the Roy brother or sisters prosper on attempting to bury each other. What’s more, if the GoJo sale fails– which appears incomparably possible– the interim CEO would in fact end up being a long-term CEO.
We discover early in this episode that Shiv is pregnant, which worsens the disappointment and powerlessness she feels. She dislikes that her siblings are leaving her out once again, however if she falls out with them, she would have nobody left on her side. Throughout “Honeymoon States,” Shiv is significantly irate and flustered by how lonesome she feels. In some methods, she was absolutely Logan’s preferred. They utilized to have weekly individually suppers; he called her Pinky. She blames herself and her siblings for their dad’s death– they required Logan into getting on an airplane to Sweden. Tom, who does not appear to understand that she’s pregnant, does sense how unloved and hurt she feels. He attempts to advise her of what might be if she simply opened herself as much as being looked after, raising a sweet old memory of their early courtship. “That was a while earlier, wasn’t it?” Shiv states dully. He presses back. “Not that long.”
Like dad like boy
In this episode, we see how, in the blink of an eye, Kendall can slip in between the variation of himself that simply desires a healthy relationship with his liked ones and the variation of himself that will eliminate if needed.
The last time Logan and his kids spoke, Shiv implicated her dad of believing he might make something real simply by declaring it held true. However Kendall comprehends the power of a story too. Simply days earlier, he would have informed anybody who asked that his daddy was a dreadful autocrat whose viewpoint wasn’t worth dirt. Now, all of a sudden, it matters that the next Waystar CEO must have the late creator’s true blessing. The board appears to concur, even if the Waystar executives look stressed; they vote him and Roman through as co-CEOs. The simmering war in between the old guard and the Roy brother or sisters is remarkably prevented, a minimum of in the meantime.
When prominent Republican megadonor Ron Petkus (Stephen Root) takes a minute to eulogize Logan, Connor grumbles that his description of Logan as a neo-conservative is incorrect: He was certainly a “paleo-libertarian.” “They’re attempting to body-snatch him,” he states.
However nobody is body-snatching Logan the method Kendall is. When Shiv and Roman keep joking around without appearing to comprehend the seriousness of having a strategy prior to the board vote, Kendall loses his mood in a really Logan-esque method. You can almost see him believing that they are not severe individuals.
After the vote is done, Karolina and Hugo confine the brand-new CEOs to go over a technique for offering their brand-new functions to the general public. There are 2 possible tacks, they describe, among which would represent them as carefully following in Logan’s steps. The other would reword who Logan remained in the general public eye, painting him as a bad dad who was losing his touch by the end, which would make Kendall and Roman appear like much-needed new blood. Roman nixes the latter concept, plainly discovering it repellent.
However Kendall, after mulling it over– and taking a look at the file once again– independently informs Hugo to start the posthumous Logan character assassination, without exposing to anybody that he purchased it. “It’s what he would do,” Kendall informs Hugo. “He ‘d desire this for the company.” Which may be real– Logan did far even worse things in his life– however it’s uncertain that he would have wished to compromise his credibility. Kendall coolly threatens Hugo into following orders in a manner Logan would absolutely appreciate. The Roy household is grieving the death of their patriarch, and all of a sudden Logan’s successor appears identified to keep his tradition alive.